The Official Absentee & Early Voting Reports Thread

[Minnesota Mike]

But that is just wrong.  It was R + 26.1 at this point in 2008, not R+20.

http://www.carolinatransparency.com/votetracker/gen2012/



19 Days before Election 2012.

Total- 67,350
Republicans- 36,514  (54.22%)
Democrats 18,251- (27.1%)


19 days before Election 2008

Total- 54,367
Republicans- 30,053 (55.0%)
Democrats- 15,786 (28.89%)

First, you are using the 2012 numbers for 2008.

Second the 2008 absentee ballots received for 10/16/08 were:

arty

    Republicans:  54.71%
    Democrats:  29.17%  

That is a gap 25.5%.  Today the gap is 27.1.  So the votes received are about 1.6 point improvement, but the applications are still running higher for R voters, so the gap is likely to grow.
    

I am using the numbers I got by hitting the "Compare to 2008" bar.

Bottom line numbers are very close to 2008 levels.

[Minnesota Mike]

I don't think anybody expects the Democrats will get the same percentage margins over Republicans in early voting in 2012 that they did in 2008 simply because this year the Romney Campaign is making an effort in Early Voting while McCain did not. To me the more interesting numbers will be comparing raw Democratic turnout in 2012 vs 2008. The Republican talking point the past couple of years has been that Democratic enthusiasm and turnout will be down this year, so far that does not seem to be the case. If Democrats show up in the numbers they did in 2008 Obama wins, simple as that.

[Minnesota Mike]

North Carolina

http://www.carolinatransparency.com/votetracker/gen2012/

Total 387,724
Dem 191,417 (49.37%)
Rep 125,350 (32.33%)
UNA 70,306 (18.13%)
Lib 651 (0.17%)

White 259,736 (66.99%)
Black 111,781 (28.83%)

Total turnout and turnout for both parties is up from same point in 2008. Reps have cut into Dems percentage advantage which is not surprising since the are emphasizing early voting much more this cycle.

[Minnesota Mike]

Florida Early Voting Update

Voted ballots:

Party         Voted         %
REP         315,987    45%
DEM         277,253    39%
IND         110,188    16%
Total         703,428    

 

Outstanding requests:
Party       Requested            %
REP         688,438    40%
DEM         689,990    40%
IND         337,446    20%
Total      1,715,874    

Read more here: http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/#storylink=cpy

[Minnesota Mike]

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Big turnout in Clark County would be a good thing for Dems.

[Minnesota Mike]

Washoe County Nevada.

Nevada's swing county.

Early Vote day 1

Total 9,638

Dems 4,604 (47.77%)
Reps 3,619 (37.54%)
Other 1,415 (14.68%)

http://www.co.washoe.nv.us/voters/11SPECEVTO.html

[Minnesota Mike]

Day 1 2008 (Sorry no link. Being the geek I am I had these numbers saved on my computer)

Total 6,554

Dems 3,909 (59.64%)
Rep 1,668 (25.45%)
Other 977 (14.91%)

FWIW Republicans do hold a small voter registration advantage in Washoe county. Any Democratic lead, even a smaller one than in 2008, is good news for the Dems.

[Minnesota Mike]

North Carolina Update

http://elections.gmu.edu/early_vote_2012.html

Good day for Democratic, African American turnout yesterday.

Total turnout 457,824

Party Reg    
Dem    50.2%
Rep    31.2%
None/Oth    18.5%

Age    

18-29    9.8%
30-44    15.4%
45-59    27.7%
60+    47.1%

Race    

White    65.6%
Black    29.9%
Other    4.5%

Gender    

Female    55.2%
Male    43.8%
Unk.    0.9%

Method    

In-person    82.4%
Mail    17.6%

[Minnesota Mike]

Washoe County Nevada.

Nevada's swing county.

Early Vote day 1

Total 9,638

Dems 4,604 (47.77%)
Reps 3,619 (37.54%)
Other 1,415 (14.68%)

http://www.co.washoe.nv.us/voters/11SPECEVTO.html

The final in 2008 was:

Dem
   47.1%
Rep
   35.3%
No/Oth
   17.5%

http://elections.gmu.edu/early_vote_2008.html

I would caution against making comparisons, but the gap is currently lower.
   

2008 early voting was a disaster for the Republicans, if they can't improve on those horrible numbers they should just give up.

BTW it's not an apples to apples comparison but in 2010 Republicans had a small lead in early voting in Washoe county and Sharon Angle still lost. If they can't come at least close in 2012 (within 5%?) I don't see how Romney wins.

[Minnesota Mike]

Republicans lost Washoe County again today, 2262 to 1830.

What was the total vote and what was the percentage?

http://www.co.washoe.nv.us/voters/11SPECEVTO.html

[Minnesota Mike]

Wow. J.J. must be just messing with us because nobody can be that dense.

[Minnesota Mike]

Okay, I think I found results for yesterday for Clark County. (The data from the Clark County government site is in .exe format which I can't open on my Mac, so I had to hunt around the internet and finally found a right-wing blog that looked semi-legit.)

Democrats: 14,934
Republicans: 9,725
Other: 5,900

So, as should be obvious, more Democrats than Republicans voted in Clark County yesterday.

I have been saving the daily results and those are the numbers I have. 

[Minnesota Mike]

Daily margin in Clark County

Oct 20- D+8,800
Oct 21- D+4,495
Oct 22- D+4,796
Oct 23- D+5,399
Oct 24- D+5,209


Total- D+28,699

(does not include absentees)

[Minnesota Mike]

Okay, I think I found results for yesterday for Clark County. (The data from the Clark County government site is in .exe format which I can't open on my Mac, so I had to hunt around the internet and finally found a right-wing blog that looked semi-legit.)

Democrats: 14,934
Republicans: 9,725
Other: 5,900

So, as should be obvious, more Democrats than Republicans voted in Clark County yesterday.

That's expected. But more important than that is the final Democratic advantage. What's the threshold between a Democratic win and a Republican win? Is it 60000?

Probably closer to 45-50,000 IMO.

[Minnesota Mike]

Clark County Day 6

Dem- 14,969
Rep- 9,434
Other- 5,866

Total- 30,269

Clark County total (Including Absentees)


Dem- 105,338
Rep- 69,294
Other- 37,107

Total- 211,739


Does not look like Washoe updated their numbers tonight.

[Minnesota Mike]

Florida

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Read more here: http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/#storylink=cpy

Democrats are doing much better in absentees in 2012 compared to 2008, cutting the margin from 16% to 5%. In person Early Voting starts tomorrow and Democrats are expected to dominate as they did in 2008. With a shortened in person early voting window will be interesting to see if they can run up the same margins as last time.

[Minnesota Mike]

Here is the same point in time from 2008:  http://www.carolinatransparency.com/votetracker/gen2008/date/1224745200/

In 2008, this was the D's best week.

Hard for Republicans not to improve on their 2008 numbers, they made almost no effort to promote early voting in 2008. Democrats also have improved from 2008 but they had a much higher bar to clear since they had very good early turnout in 2008.

[Minnesota Mike]

Dem turnout in Florida has passed Rep turnout.

http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/02d4625f10044a63b22796a30f29eee4/FL--Early-Voting

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Only took 2 days to wipe out Rep advantage in Absentees.

[Minnesota Mike]

Interesting. Republicans are closing the gap in percentage terms, but Dems maintain and expand it in absolute terms.

Dems have expanded it every single day in absolute terms since Early Voting started.

[Minnesota Mike]

Democrats almost at +60,000 in Iowa. Very nice.

Ah, in 2008, it was +86,000. 

And in 2008 Obama won Iowa by 146K.

[Minnesota Mike]

Do people like J.J. not understand that Obama won in a landslide last time? Simply being in the same neighborhood as his 2008 numbers is sufficient for him.

+60,000 in Iowa right now = winning

Welcome and I agree.

[Minnesota Mike]

Do people like J.J. not understand that Obama won in a landslide last time? Simply being in the same neighborhood as his 2008 numbers is sufficient for him.

+60,000 in Iowa right now = winning

Welcome and I agree.

Unfortunately for you the GOP will be surging 70-80k on election day just like 2004.

But in 2004 there were fewer early voters. Tougher to get 70-80K out of a smaller pool of voters that will be left on election day.

[Minnesota Mike]

Washoe County Nevada

Tonight (Early Votes)

Total 14,234

Dem 5,343
Rep 5,348

Total (all Early Votes + Absentees thru Thur)

Total 124,499

Dem 50,269
Rep 50,219

Turnout

69% of 2008 total turnout. 

So be basically we have a tie, which is good for Obama. He does not need to win Washoe, he just has to hold Romney's advantage down to less than about 5%.

[Minnesota Mike]

Iowa Early:

Total Returned: 640,248
Democrats: 270,796 (42.3%)
Republicans: 205,697 (32.1%)
Other: 163,755 (25.6%)

Democratic Margin of 65,099

33.1% of registered voters have already voted.
43.6% of registered Democrats have already voted
32.8% of registered Republicans have already voted.
23.8% of registered others have voted

Turnout is currently 41.5% of the total 2008 turnout.

I know Republicans turn out in greater numbers on election day but they have a pretty large hole to dig out of. Conventional wisdom was they had to hold Dems to under a 60,000 early vote lead and that's not happening. Advantage Democrats.

[Minnesota Mike]

Since they have great demographics, I worked out the African American vote in NC.

In 2008, 51.6% of the black electorate had voted.

In 2012, 50.3% of the black electorate had voted.

Note that black registration has changed:

2008:  21.6%

2012:  22.4%

To nitpick a bit the last update has the Black turnout up to 50.5%

http://ftp://www.app.sboe.state.nc.us/enrs/absentee11xx06xx2012_Stats.pdf

Total African American turnout is up 50,000 compared to the same time in 2008.